ThunderX3 TM60 Laser Gaming Mouse Review

Introduction

ThunderX3 are one of the newest players in the peripherals market, coming from the well-known Aerocool, the new ThunderX3 brand effectively represents Aerocools own gaming division, albeit under its own unique moniker. While the market is quite saturated with brands, we always welcome more choice and given that we already know these new gaming products are designed and manufactured by Aerocool, not some rebranded OEM garbage, we’re very excited to take a look at their new products, and eager to show you what they have to offer. We kick off our first ThunderX3 review today with their new TM60 Laser Gaming Mouse, but we’ll have more products to share with you in the coming weeks.

Equipped with a high-performance 9800 sensor, the well tried and tested Omron switches, a 32-bit processor for lag-free input and processing, on-board memory, RGB lighting, and so much more, the TM60 is certainly ticking all the right boxes for a high-performance gaming mouse; enough to put it on par with the competition, at least on paper.

Packaging

The box is very nicely designed, with a clear image of the product on the front, as well as badges showing off the 16.8 million colour RGB lighting, as well as the 16,000 DPI laser sensor.

Around the back, a multi-language breakdown of the main features, such as the AVAGO-9800 sensor and interchangeable grips.

Open the box out, you’ll find a full technical run-down, as well as a nicely labeled image showing all the major aspects of the TM60.

Accessories

There isn’t a whole lot in the box, but certainly everything you’ll need. The mouse comes hard-wired with a very nice quality braided cable and a gold-plated USB connector. The other part is a soft rubber grip side panel, which you can install on the mouse in place of the hard plastic one; we’ll try that shortly.

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A Closer Look

Initial impressions of the TM60 are extremely positive. The build quality obviously looks great, but it feels even better. The mouse has a really good weight to it and while it’s quite large and wide, this only brings benefits to those who use a palm rest play style. Of course, if you’re a hybrid/claw/fingertip grip player, take not of those lightly scooped side panels and extra soft rubber grips, as they really help you get a firm hold on the mouse, regardless of your play style.

Down the left side, you’ll find two well-placed side buttons, each has a really nice tactile click to them for good feedback while gaming.

The right side of the mouse has a removable hard plastic wing, which is contoured to provide a natural finger resting position. You’ll notice that the mouse is made up from multiple panels, each with a slightly different finish, which I think looks pretty cool, as it gives it a unique appearance.

The mouse wheel is huge, one of the largest we’ve seen and it’s extra wide too. The size of the wheel gives you excellent control over it and that’s enhanced even further by the soft rubber grip coating and light tactile bump when the wheel is rotated; perfect for gaming.

Here you can see just how wide the mouse is and you can also see how the aluminium chassis curves up at the front; the mouse wheel looks even bigger here too!

The base of the mouse is a single piece of brushed aluminium and when combined with the Teflon slipmats, it’s easy to see why this mouse glides so smoothly, despite the fact it has a little bit of a bulky weight (175g); I like a weighted mouse, but that’s obviously a subjective quality.

The palm rest panel is mounted securely, but you can pull it off without the use of tools to change it for the rubber grip panel.

The rather flexible rubber grip panel is really nice, as it’s absolutely massive and the squishy rubber texture on it means you can really dig your fingers in to get an uncompromising grip on the mouse; handy for lift-off techniques when using low-DPI settings.

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Performance

For their first range of peripherals, I wasn’t expecting the software to be so well designed! The layout is stylish enough and all the major functions are very easy to locate and tweak to your liking. The buttons are fully programmable with commands, macros and more, and everything can be saved to one of three profiles, each of which can be saved directly to the mouse for later recall, making it tournament friendly.

The lighting can be easily configured using an RGB colour selector, so you’ll have no issues finding your favourite hue or effect.

Acceleration can be completely turned off, which we’ll certainly be leaving off. The DPI can be configured over four modes for quick changing via the on-mouse DPI button, and the polling range can be switched from 125 up to 1000.

The sensor is smooth as silk with no jitter of angle snapping issues across the bulk of the range. Things look a little wobbly at 16k DPI, but if you’re using extreme DPI like that to do fine work, you’re completely bonkers, if you’re scrolling the map of a game or wanting lightning fast turret turns in Battlefield, however, you’ll be thankful for that crazy high tracking speed.

The RGB lighting is tasteful, with the logo at the back as well as the inner section of the scroll wheel giving off some vivid and rich colours of your choosing.

As I said before, the grip and size of this mouse is superb, and the ergonomics work well for virtually any play style. Gaming is an absolute joy and the mouse tracks smooth and accurate in any scenario. While the weighted design may not be as preferable to those who like a light mouse for CS:GO, I prefer the smooth tracking of a heavy mouse and it’s great for LoL and DOTA 2, but also long-term comfort for MMORPG gameplay.

Having full command of the button configuration is great for MMO/MOBA gaming, especially when it comes to configuring multiple profiles for each game/character type, setting macros and shortcuts for each, as you can quickly get the right set of controls when you absolutely need them most.

Overall, a great gaming mouse and one that is equally well suited to day-to-day work.

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Final Thoughts

Price

The ThunderX3 will be hitting the market very soon and we’ll push to have retail links for you as soon as they’re available. Right now, we’re hearing that the ThunderX3 TM60 Laser Gaming Mouse will hit stores for a very reasonable £47.99, which isn’t especially cheap, but it’s affordable enough to take the wind out of the sails of rivals brands with similar specification and performance mice.

Overview

For their first entry into the gaming peripherals market, the TM60 knocks it out of the park. This doesn’t feel like a first run product, it feels well researched, very well designed, tested, like it has a history to it, even though it doesn’t. It’s clear that Aerocool did their research and it really shows in the final product, as it’s up to a level of development that it’s a real contender in the market.

For gaming, the TM60 is ticking all of the right boxes for both stay at home gamers and competitive eSports. There’s a high-performance sensor courtesy of Avago, which tracks perfectly and even offers extremely high max DPI settings for fast-tracking, as well as premium grade OMRON switches, which as we all know are hugely popular, reliable and offer a very good tactile response that’s perfect for fast paced gaming, as well as day to day work. The overall build quality compliments all this, with a brushed aluminium chassis that gives it a well-ballanced design and a low center of gravity, as well as excellent glide, a durable and lightweight braided cable, soft rubber grip side panels for added control, fully programmable buttons, RGB lighting and versatile desktop software; the list goes on.

At this price range, I was expecting far less of this mouse, and once again for their first gaming mouse, I wasn’t setting the bar too high anyway, but I was wrong to underestimate it and for this level of build quality, high-end performance and wallet-friendly prices, we’re already eager to bring you more reviews of ThunderX3 products over the coming weeks, months and beyond.

Pros

Durable build quality

Stylish and unique aesthetics

High-performance sensor

Swappable side panel

RGB LED lighting

Fully programmable switches

Competitive price

16k DPI

Cons

None

“The ThunderX3 TM60 is easily one of the best value for money gaming mice we’ve ever seen. Competitive performance and flawless build quality at mid-range prices is something no gamer can ignore and we expect the TM60 is going to be a big hit with gamers around the world.”

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